Why Iron Fist Season 2 Has A New Showrunner

Marvel TV head Jeph Loeb explained why Iron Fist is bringing in a new showrunner for its second season – replacing Scott Buck with Raven Metzner. It is no secret that the debut of the Finn Jones-led series was not ideal. Often dubbed the weakest link among the four shows that Marvel’s partnership with Netflix has spawned thus far, the show lacked the thrilling aspect of other properties under the same franchise, replaced with a storyline surrounding the Rand Corporation – a shame in hindsight given Danny Rand’s interesting origins in the comics that could have opened a lot more doors for storytelling, especially in terms of the mystic arts side.

Despite this, Loeb and his team are not giving up on the property. During The Defenders panel at year’s San Diego Comic-Con, the producer extraordinaire surprised everyone by announcing season 2 of Iron Fist. The announcement was subsequently followed by the revelation that former Sleepy Hollow producer, Metzner, will take the baton from Buck in the follow-up installment. This has immediately caused presumptions that the showrunner switch is a step towards supposed course correcting the show, but the exec says it is not.

Loeb cleared the air in a recent interview with Tracking Board, explaining that replacing Buck is not a way to course-correct the Marvel Netflix series. As it turns out, there was nothing more to it than just the usual scheduling conflicts with the production having to push through without him:

“What happened, really very simply, was [Season 1 showrunner] Scott Buck was on [ABC Marvel series] Inhumans and we were delighted to get another order from Netflix and knew that Scott was not going to be available to us. We set out to find a new showrunner. Raven came in, told us a story and we thought, ‘that’s the next epic adventure for this character’ and got very excited about it.”

Marvel’s Inhumans, of course, is the upcoming IMAX and ABC television series (joining Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.on the broadcasting channel’s superhero roster) that will center on the Inhuman Royal Family. The project was originally set to be part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Phase 3 as a feature-length film until it was pulled from the release slate and reworked to be a small screen show instead.

Other than the official order and showrunner change for the Iron Fist follow-up, information regarding the sequel is still rather thin. Jones previously teased a more action-packed installment as Rand slowly fully becomes the hero he is meant to be. And with Metzer’s supposed martial arts expertise, we might finally get some gritty action sequences where Rand can finally showcase what his glowing fist can really do.

Before setting off for his new adventure in the second outing of Iron Fist, Rand will be joining the other three grounded superheroes of New York – Daredevil (Charlie Cox), Jessica Jones (Krysten Ritter) and Luke Cage (Mike Colter) – in next month’s The Defenders. The foursome’s unlikely team will be up against the mysterious Alexandra (Sigourney Weaver) to stop her and Madame Gao’s (Wai Ching Ho) villainous plans.

Marvel’s The Defenders premieres on August 18th, followed by The Punisher season 1 later this fall. Premiere dates for the new seasons of Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist have yet to be announced.